Sprinklings of history, a smidgen of genealogy, a dash of art & a dusting of architecture, all mixed together with my eccentric fascinations

03 September 2016

It’s a sign: East Sussex

You know I just can’t resist a
well-designed / interesting / lovely / intriguing / memorable / fascinating
sign when I see one so, of course, I photographed a few during my recent short
break in East Sussex. Here they are:

The
Kings Head, Battle

The Kings Head is reputed to be the oldest
pub in Battle
but I don’t know if that’s actually true. The English Heritage website says it’s
a Grade II-listed timber-framed building, dating from the 17th century or
earlier, though it has at some point been modernised and had a new front
attached. When researching this piece, I found a fascinating reference to
documents, pertaining to the building, that are held at the East Sussex Record Office.

The will of
William Easton of Battle gent., dated 1783,
proved PCC 1789, among other property devises a freehold messuage in Battle to John Longley the elder of Battle bricklayer and then to his son John ...
In a mortgage of Nov 1810, the property is called Delveday ...

In Nov 1833, Ann Longley conveyed this property to her mother Mary ... who in
Oct 1837 sold it to Thomas Wickham of Battle, miller
for £650 ... The property passed to his daughter Elizabeth, wife of William
Austin of Battle, victualler ... In June 1845, they sold the property, now
known as the Kings Head Inn, for £735 to William Miskin of Broad Street,
Horselydown, Surrey and others ... [and there is more]

The pub obviously has a long and
interesting history. It also does reasonable food, as we discovered when we
stopped off here for an early dinner on our way home from RyeHarbour.

The
Cuckmere Inn, Cuckmere Haven

This
was our lunch stop on the day we spent at the Seven Sisters Country Park,
and a very pleasant one it was too. Conveniently situated at Exceat, on the
road between Seaford and Eastbourne, and overlooking the CuckmereRiver,
the outdoor terraces proved a very pleasant place to eat and sparrow watch – a rather
large flock has discovered the joys of human leftovers.

Though
I haven’t been able to date the Inn, I imagine
it is quite old. It is perfectly sited as a transfer point when the nearby
beach at Cuckmere Haven was used by smugglers in the Middle Ages. The top part
of the sign includes part of the coat of Arms of the nearby port of Seaford:
the ‘lion-hulks’ (half lion half ship) appear in the heraldry of many of the Cinque
Ports towns, and the eagle comes from the coat of arms of the d'Aquila family, former landowners in
medieval times. The lower part of the sign shows the meandering Cuckmere
River, and the motto ‘E ventis vires’ means ‘From the wind, strength’, a
reference to the days of sailing ships.

The Cuckmere
Inn used to be called the Golden Galleon, an allusion to Drake’s galleon the Golden Hind perhaps or to the Famous
Five book? Who knows. I do know lunch was delicious!

Unstable
ground

This sign appears at the start of the Seven
Sisters cliff-top walk and other similar warning signs have been hammered into
the ground all along the cliff tops. Unfortunately, the warnings are frequently
ignored by walkers, who range perilously close to the cliff edges, as you can
see from my photo. They’re mad! The chalk is crumbly and, with constant encouragement
from wind and rain, large slices of cliff fall off on a regular basis.

The
Ram, Firle

Another day, another scrumptious pub lunch.
The Ram is in the tiny historic village
of Firle and is part of
the 500-year-old Firle Estate, owned by the Gage family. The inn is a Grade II-listed,
brick and flint building that used to be a regular rest stop for the Lewes to
Alfriston coach – that’s horse and coach, not motorised bus! The building was
also once used as the village court room where the rents for tenant farmers
were set and collected. Nowadays, it’s a popular lunch stop and also has
boutique accommodation if you fancy a weekend away in a delightful setting.

Metal
detecting prohibited

After our lunch at the Ram in Firle, we
drove to the top of the hills above and walked a few miles of the South Downs Way.
This sign hung on a gate into farmland at the beginning of our walk. In case
you can’t quite make it out the sign reads: ‘Firle Estate. METAL DETECTING ON
THIS LAND IS A CRIMINAL OFFENCE. To Report an incident Please Call the Estate
Office on xxx or Sussex
Police on xxx.’ It’s the first time I’ve seen anything like this but, as the
hilltops are dotted with ancient Bronze Age barrows and Neolithic earthworks, I
can certainly understand the prohibition on amateur metal detecting.

About Me

I am a writer and photographer; project
manager and English teacher; knitter and genealogist; fungi forayer and bird
watcher; countryside rambler and city strider; volunteer and child sponsor; tree
lover and cat person; researcher and blogger; nemophilist; and traveller.